New Delhi: State-owned National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) on Thursday said consultancy firms will be restricted to a maximum number of 10 projects per engineer for supervision of construction or maintenance of national highway projects.
NHAI in a statement said it was observed that the consultancy firms working as independent engineers, authority engineers or supervision consultants are assigning supervision obligations of many projects to a designated engineer.
"The restriction of a maximum of Ten projects per ‘Engineer’ shall come into effect after 60 days, providing time to the Consultancy firms to make appropriate adjustments in this period," it said.
The compliance of specifications and contract provisions is primarily controlled and supervised by the consultant’s team through the designated ‘engineer’ assigned to a particular project.
"Due to more number of projects in hand, the designated engineer may not be able to fulfil contractual obligations, defeating the purpose of qualitative and quantitative monitoring of the projects, " the statement said.
Detailed clauses have also been included in the guidelines for consultancy firms implementing and maintaining National Highway projects on Hybrid Annuity Mode (HAM) and Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) mode.
The clauses include provisions for the appointment of Independent Engineers/Authority Engineers and Delegation of responsibilities. The designated ‘engineer’ from the consulting firm is required to visit the assigned project site every month and provide inputs in the Monthly Progress Report as per consultancy and civil contract provisions.
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